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New•Land•Marks: public art,
community, and the meaning of place
is a program of the Fairmount Park Art Association
that brings together artists and community
organizations to plan and create new works
throughout Philadelphia. New•Land•Marks
proposals
incorporate public art into ongoing community
development, urban greening, public amenities,
and other revitalization initiatives. These
efforts celebrate community identity, commemorate
“untold” histories, and offer
visionary, yet reasonable, ways to invigorate
public spaces.
Learn
more about New•Land•Marks!
Program
Overview
Participants
and Proposals
New•Land•Marks
Book
Exhibition and
Events
Program
Overview
To begin the New•Land•Marks
program, the Art Association asked communities
to volunteer their participation and simultaneously
sent out a call to local, national, and
international artists. To introduce the
program, presentations and community meetings
were held at branch libraries and cultural
centers throughout the city, highlighting
significant public art projects worldwide
and the need for responsible stewardship.
Communities were asked to think about what
they wanted to leave for future generations.
From hundreds of “Requests to Participate,”
the Art Association invited eighteen communities
and twenty-five artists to work with the
program. For artists, the selection process
focused on how their ongoing work addressed
the stated interests of the community groups.
For almost a year, community representatives
and artists engaged in a dialogue and design
development process.
The design development
phase featured a series of Public Art Workshops
that addressed essential issues related
to the creation of public art. The series
culminated in a New•Land•Marks
Symposium at the Philadelphia Museum of
Art in May 1999. At this significant event,
artists and community participants presented
their proposals in a public forum.
Sixteen proposals
were endorsed by the participating communities,
and the Art Association then commissioned
five of these projects. Other proposals
moved into a research and development phase.
During 2000, a community exhibition traveled
to locations in participating neighborhoods,
offering the opportunity to view proposal
materials in the community contexts from
which the work emerged. A major exhibition
about the program was on view at the Pennsylvania
Academy of Fine Arts from February–April
2001. |
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A
book
about the program accompanied the exhibition
at the Academy. |
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| In 2002, the New•Land•Marks
program received an EDRA/Places
Award for Place Planning by the Environmental
Design Research Association and Places,
A Forum of Environmental Design.
For communities, the New•Land•Marks
program has been an opportunity to take
an active role in defining the unique qualities
of their neighborhoods. For artists, the
program has represented a chance to work
directly with the public from an early point
in the creative process. New•Land•Marks
explores the central issue in today's public
art— namely, how to promote community
engagement and, at the same time, create
a framework for the most creative artistic
outcome.
The New•Land•Marks
program has been made possible through the
generous support of the William Penn Foundation,
the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual
Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts,
the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, the
Samuel S. Fels Fund, the Independence Foundation,
the Leeway Foundation, the Mid Atlantic
Arts Foundation, and the Philadelphia Exhibitions
Initiative, a grant program of The Pew Charitable
Trusts administered by The University of
the Arts, Philadelphia.
For more information about
New•Land•Marks, please
visit the pages listed below or consult
the book New•Land•Marks:
public art, community, and the meaning
of place, published in 2001 by
Editions Ariel, an imprint of Grayson Publishing.
Learn
more about New•Land•Marks!
Program
Overview
Participants
and Proposals
New•Land•Marks
Book
Exhibition and
Events |
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